bug#12646: 24.2.50; Eshell problem with mailx(1)

[Stephen Berman <stephen.berman@gmx.net>]

On Mon, 15 Oct 2012 12:39:53 +0200 Andreas Schwab <schwab@linux-m68k.org> wrote:

> Stephen Berman <stephen.berman@gmx.net> writes:
>
>> I'm still interested to know why I encounter the bug only in Eshell and
>> only with mailx, not with less itself; do you have any idea?
>
> $ stty rows 0

Do you mean that, as far as Eshell is concerned, the terminal always has
0 rows?  At least `stty -a' in Eshell always shows "rows 0", no matter
what value I give to N in `stty rows N' at the eshell prompt, whereas in
a linux console, e.g. KDE Konsole, `stty rows 0' does indeed change the
rows terminal characteristic and prevents reading mail with mailx, just
as in Eshell.  But e.g. `stty rows 37' in Konsole -- but not in Eshell
-- restores the number of rows and the use of mailx (however, `stty rows
0' in Konsole also appears to suppress echoing of keys, and e.g. `stty
rows 37' does not restore that).  If my understanding of your answer is
correct, then it seems to me that this indicates an Eshell doc bug and
should at least be noted in PROBLEMS.  Of course, the Eshell manual has
always been mostly empty, so it may be regarded as a known bug, but this
particular case (the change in behavior in mailx when invoked from
eshell) is not obvious and likely to catch others who, like me, are not
well-acquainted with how such properties of ttys interact with commands
like mailx.

Steve Berman